Tuesday, November 13, 2018

Pitcher

Make sure to check out Jolyn's new story on Strangerville, if you haven't yet!

*****

I was riding on the Subway when I heard something that hurt my ears. It came from a woman's mouth. She was in her 50s. Pleasant-looking and probably kind. So that's why it caught me so off guard.

"Larry," she said to the man sitting next to her, a man who looked exactly like her but bald, so I assumed they were married, "did you get a good pitcher of the Empire State Building?"

No. She wasn't asking if he had purchased a pitcher in the shape of the thing. She clearly meant "picture." You know. That word that has the letter C in the middle of it and is not even remotely similar in meaning to the word this woman had said.

It caught me off guard that she would say such a thing because I firmly believe that saying "pitcher" when you mean "picture" actually makes you a bad person. And she just didn't look like a bad person.

I mean, I'm not saying that doing this makes you truly evil. On the scale of indiscretions, this habit would fall exactly between sitting through a green light with a row of cars behind you and first degree murder of a pretty child. So, no, it won't necessarily send you straight to hell, but it will necessarily make you possibly deserve it.
Every time I hear someone say it, I involuntarily make this set of pretentious expressions:

And don't even think I haven't noticed the frown wrinkles.

What these people are doing is an actual hate crime.

They should be denounced by the UN. AND NASA.

I'm allowed to rant about this because I have friends and family who do this thing, and I used to do it myself. It's the same reason I get to call gay people "homos" and you don't. Not that there's anything wrong with being gay. Besides the fact that we're all going to hell right along with a good portion of the people who say "pitcher" when they mean "picture," which I guess is why I'm so sensitive about it. The thought of spending an eternity with people who do this thing is what will actually make gay hell torture for me.

Yes. I hate it that much. I hate when people say "pitcher" so much that if a genie appeared in front of me and said that if I pulled a lever it would stop everyone from ever doing this again, but 35 random people would be killed by salmonella, I would pull it. Twice.

I have tried to talk several of my family members out of this practice, but they just laugh at me and then say it with greater emphasis the next time because they apparently don't care at all about my happiness.

Parents who teach their children to do this should be reported for child abuse. Their names should go on a registry. They shouldn't be allowed to rent cars or vote. They should be the first ones to get the salmonella when I pull the lever.

Look. I can't save that woman on the Subway. Her soul is probably lost. All I can do is let it ruin my week and give me frown wrinkles. So that's what I'm going to do.

That, and ask you to rant about the things people say that drive you crazy, too.

Apparently the way I say Oyster rhymes with Moisture and I say Pen and Pin the exact same way, and when anyone tries to tell me I'm wrong I just tell them it's my accent and I'm from here and their sorry transplant butts can go back where they came from. (They don't actually have butt transplants, that I know of.)(Not that I know what a butt is)

I've been married almost 30 years and only recently noticed that my husband does the pen/pin thing! I guess we'd just never had a discussion where I heard it before. I think he needs to start saying "ink pen" so I know for sure what he's talking about.

I was gonna say something similar to this...I used to work woth a woman who either thought the words "idea" and "ideal" were the same word, or was unaware that "idea" existed at all. Maybe she had been raised to think the "l" was silent. I dunno. But in many emails I received from her through the 7 years I worked with her, and in the many conversations in which it came up, she would say, "I think that's a good ideal..." or, "Does anyone have an ideal on this?" ::screaming and pulling out hair:: She was in her early 60's. IT MADE NO SENSE.

Yes yes yes! I was going to have a big rant about seen. It's the worst. To me, it's somebody's way of letting the rest of know that they were raised in the sticks and didn't start wearing shoes until they were 20 and have lost most of their teeth.

There are So. Many. But off the top of my head:She done it again, even though I axed her not to. (double-barreled horrible)I seen it with my own eyes. And whenever I talked to him... when they mean *when*. Just when.Worsh instead of wash...I have family members who say this one. Snow. Okay, that's an actual word used in a legitimate way, but I keep hearing it in our weather forecast and I really don't like it. So I'm sneaking it in here.

I am a southerner currently living in Iowa and I had to learn a whole new language here. Instead of "I am going to loan that to her." people say, "I am going to borrow her that." ??? "Do you want to come with?" With what?! There are more, but it makes my head hurt. Also? Yay for snow!

Sherry - I've lived here all my life. We love to do that, LOL. "I'm going to the store. Do you want to come with?" would be very common. I would never say that borrow sentence, though...it would be more like, "I'm going to loan her that." Growing up, ending a sentence with 'with' would have been frowned upon by my mom...but I hear it so much in every day life now, that I sometimes say it - but not very often! Fun fact: Communications companies send people to Iowa to learn our 'neutral' lack of accent. Newscasters and the like. So if you notice a southern news person without a heavy accent, they are either from elsewhere originally or have been schooled in our accent-less accent. As for the snow, phthththth! If the snow didn't come with so much COLD and slick roads it would be more acceptable. And here is a phrase I say a lot: "It's not so much the cold as the wind!"

We say "melk" in our family and cannot say it correctly. And every time, our friends laugh at us. It's a northern thing and we live in the South. But please don't send us to hell. We really are nice people and try to say it correctly. :)

I know some people are irritated by "Lay-uhn" and "moun-uhns," but I actually find it even more irritating to hear people awkwardly and purposefully pronounce the T in those words. Like you can hear it that they don't naturally say it that way, but they don't want to be Utah hicks, so there's an ever-so-slight pause while they focus and then say both syllables with equal emphasis. "LAY-TON." "MOUN-TAINS." Does that make sense?

It's a hump you have to get over. Several years ago I decided I didn't want to be a Utah hick with those two words anymore so I made a concerted effort. For probably half a decade I sounded like a complete idiot with all of my concerted effort to get the T in the right place. But I like to think that it has now become natural enough that I could even talk to the queen.

Interesting. My grandma was raised in Utah before they moved to Iowa, but I don't remember hearing her not using the t's. I guess she was reformed. Now, she did say KMark and Shears and Rosebucks, so she wasn't exactly a linguistics expert.

I work at a school and the teacher says "pitcher" and "senence" (sentence) and so many more (including manybof our math vocabulary words). And it drives me crazy because she's a freaking TEACHER! Every time she gets in front of the class I cringe .

It's very noticeable in Utah and it's been studied by linguists as a regional anomaly. But I've noticed it in other areas of the country. In North Carolina there's a town called Manteo and it's pronounced manny-o.

My friends refer to me as a grammar Nazi (apologies to anyone who is offended by the term Nazi). They send me grammar memes all the time because they know I'll love them. My son is taking after me and corrects his friends' grammar and it's hilarious (to me and my friends, not to his friends).

However, my husband is going to hell because not only does he use words improperly - he will do so purposefully to annoy me. For example - he says "Miawell" - this means Might as well. Not even close to acceptable. He also takes irregardless a step further and says irregardlessly . . . . ARGH!!!!

Libary (without the first R)"Crown" instead of Crayon"Di-in't" instead of Didn'tI listened to the podcast on my way to work this morning, and I remember cringing at something Jolyn said that fell along these lines, but I can't remember now what it was. I double-cringed because she was a teacher. ��

I'm actually in the south, and I hear these from people who aren't from around here. I have a whole list of "southern-isms" like this that also drive me absolutely insane, but I'm used to hearing them so they don't stand out quite as much.

As a sciencey person my word is nuclear. You say it new-cle-er. Not new-cue-laar. Soooo many people say this incorrectly that I'm pretty sure they have to put both pronunciations in the new Webster's dictionary.

I especially hate it when actors pronounce nuclear wrong in TV/movies. These people's entire job is to say words into a camera. How did no one on that set correct them?? My husband and I share an eye roll every time we hear this wrong in the media.

As a linguist who prefers descriptivism to prescriptivism, I’ve learned to not be so bothered by most pronunciation things. But the thing that will always bug me is apostrophes in plurals and singular third person present tense verbs. “He run’s to buy apple’s.” *shudders* And we are getting to the time of year where nearly everyone pluralizes their last name incorrectly. “Love, the Smith’s” No. No. No. Stop.

'Reason being is' and 'Trouble is, is that...' - So redundant. It drives me nuts. And I also want to agree with the one up above somewhere that said 'Whenever', like when people say 'Whenever I was little'. I always want to ask those people how many times they were little, or whatever else they saying whenever about. Oh, I have so many more, but those are all I can think of for now. I'm sure in a minute somebody will say something horrible and I'll want to rant again.

Often the use of the word "that" is simply unnecessary. My mother was a legal secretary and an excellent grammarian and proofread all of my papers when I was growing up (so it's her fault I'm like this). She taught me early on "that" is an empty word. If you can say the same sentence and remove "that" and it means the same thing, take it out.

My mother in law watches a lot of the BBC in her spare time (which is ALL her time) and now she says things like “comp-nee” when she’s asking if we’re having people over. Her inflection has even changed to sound more British. It makes me want to punch things.

Other words: expecially (gag), I seen it (double gag), I COULD care less (this would indicate that the person does, in fact, care)... so many that are native to Utah - fill/feel, pill/peel, mill/meal, dill/deal - I could go on and on there.

And public service announcement since the Christmas card season is upon us: If you are sending a card to the Smiths, there is no need for an apostrophe. It’s not “The Smith’s” it’s just “The Smiths.” And If this makes you feel awkward then remove the S altogether and just put “family” at the end. Also, I know this post was about pronunciation and I made it about punctuation, but I won’t apologize. This evil must be stopped.

"Hi there, how are you today?" "I'm good." 'Good' is a noun, like an apple. Are you an apple today? I guess that's a grammar error vs. a pronunciation blunder, but it's so commonly misused and drives me crazy.

Thank you Brittany! It really depends on context. Well is an adverb and when someone is asking "how are you" they typically are leaving out the "doing" or "feeling" at the end. Well is proper because it "doing" and "feeling" are verbs and "well" describes the verbs. Now - if someone is asking "how are you" and the implied question is "how are you at typing? - then "good" is the correct answer because you're essentially saying "I'm a good typist".

I have two things that probably existed pre-social media, but I just didn't realize that people *actually* thought they were correct:1.) "Should of." Arghhhh! I always assumed they were using the contraction "should've." 2.) "Walla" instead of "Voila!". People, people, people. I never knew people thought this was a thing!!

When people say "there's" when it should be "there are". Like "there's too many people here." Ew.Also, my husband's whole family calls his brother "Dinny" in a pen/pin sort of situation. And since he never has to say his own name around family, the question of whether he pronounces it right will forever haunt me. Does he know his name is Denny? Does he?

Intimidating to comment on this thread because I'm sure I'm opening myself up to critique, but here I go anyway. Being from the South, I cannot distinguish between Dinny and Denny...like, I have no idea what the difference is. Same goes for pen and pin. If I try to say them like I think they probably SHOULD be pronounced, I just sound as if I'm trying out a fake British accent.Also, my apologies to Denny. I will be no help to him on his journey to properly pronounce his name.

My number one cringe-worthy moment is hearing "Me and her" for "She and I" (and variations on that earpolluting phrase -- anybody who says this is dumber than dirt. I will stop there before I add "I woudda went...." Too late.... AAARRRRGH.

But there are ALWAYS words/phrases that catch on like an infection in the population (like starting a sentence with "I mean' even among close friends WHO NO BETTER...or maybe they don't...YIKES and cannot be stopped, so I just try to ignore it (Ha!) and wait for it the next hideous, ear-jarring, stomach-churning replacement.

But I'm afraid the confusion between me/I & him/he is here to stay -- it is even appearing in newly produced period costume dramas in British productions!!!!!!!

I always roll my eyes when someone says something like, "She gave it to she and I" You can tell the person is trying SO hard to say 'she and I' because they learnt it in school (leanrt was intentional ;) )

I disagree with the person who says it's wrong to say "I'm good." Here's a post on it: https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/good-versus-well. That being said and despite my efforts to be a descriptivist, I don't love when people put emphasis on the wrong part of a word.

When people say "Ax" when they mean "Ask." "Imma gonna ax him a question."Using "myself" instead of "me" or "I". "Jim and myself stopped at the store to get a coke."Using "seen" instead of "saw." "We seen a deer last night when we was coming home." (Bonus if they use two incorrect words in a sentence!)It's more fun if you play Grammar Slugbug. Slug your companion anytime you hear a misused word. If they slug you when it wasn't incorrect, you get to slug them back. Bonus points if you spot misused apostrophes anywhere on signage.

Also, a personal pet peeve lately is when people mix up "fewer" and "less." "There were less people at this party this year than last year." Use fewer when it's something you can count, less if it's something you can't.

I had a math teacher in high school that was about to introduce a new principle. He prefaced it with this long explanation of how when we heard him say “spatial” he was actually saying “special”. He was WELL aware of it. He had had it pointed out to him many a time before, but he could not break into. Solution: make it part of his lesson.

Also, my mom and I used to say “on-chiladas”. Finally my sister-in-law, who grew up in Mexico and Texas, pointed it out in an “I can’t take it anymore!!” kind of way. So of course we still say it that way, but only when she’s around.

This is a great collection. Way to go Strangers! My mom says "volleyvall" instead of volleyball and "kindiegarten" instead of kindergarten. Makes me cringe every time. My husband is a realtor and his pet word peeve is when people say he is a "realator" rather than realtor.

Most of mine have been covered, but I will add “could OF” instead of could have “all the sudden” instead of all of a sudden“Brefast” instead of breakfast“Woof” instead of wolfAnd I have noticed that “whenever” instead of “when” (eg “we did that whenever we went to prom last year”) is kind of a Midwest and south/east thing

Jodi in Iowa, I just know that my in-laws (from Kansas) say it, and I had a college friend from South Carolina (it was it Georgia? We were obviously very close) who said it too, so I made a super broad blanket statement haha 🤣

And also I grew up saying “cue-pon” and then someone told me it’s “coo-pon” and I now whenever I have to say coupon out loud I basically have a stroke from the stress of not knowing how I should say it.

Libaree for Library; corter for quarter... my mom was a speech therapist and I got corrected while she drove, from the front seat ALL THE TIME and it stuck and now I can't understand why everyone doesn't enunciate....

Did you just jump inside my brain!? I don't even know you and just fell in love with you. My friend sent me this link because of our mutual hatred for that word that isn't even the real word. You are my new life hero. And of all the hells...pitcher hell would be the most torturous. Bless you

I'm always late, but please read my comment(s) anyway.You cannot know, Eli, how much I relate to you!! I have lived a version of your pain (especially the living overseas thing that is great and everyone thinks it's great... but sometimes it is SO not great).

Anyway, I say "onry" For example, "He's so onry" Meaning he is really grumpy/rude/unpleasant. My daughter is shocked and appalled and assures me there is no such word! I think I mean 'ornery' but I don't even know it that's a real word.